


The Disentanglement of Life and Death

by E_Ingram_1941



Series: War Stories [1]
Category: Dunkirk (2017)
Genre: Boys In Love, Dunkirk, Help, Historical Figures, Historical References, Idiots in Love, Multi, Original Character(s), Original Fiction, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:48:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25561570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/E_Ingram_1941/pseuds/E_Ingram_1941
Summary: For a moment, none of it is real.
Series: War Stories [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1852408
Kudos: 2





	1. Sparrow 2

**In Skies Over Belgium**  
**14 May 1940**

He has never liked Belgian air.

“Sparrow 2, what’s your vision?” Over the static, he hears a familiar voice break his thoughts. He waits a moment to respond, giving his friend a moment to worry as he looks around himself. The May wind is cold with tension, forcing them to fly lower than he would prefer, given the territory, and there is the lightest fog hugging his plane. “Sparrow 2, what’s your vision?” Again, the repeated question. Again, the allowance for wait. He’s none too keen on giving in just yet, and when he pulls his goggles up in hopes to see better through the thick of – “Ingram I will kick your arse if you do no-"

“Fog,” he replies, smirking at Gaines having broken usual protocol. “I see fog, Sparrow leader.” He wants to tell the man to put sog in his mouth, but there are sprogs on the static able to hear him, so he keeps it to himself.

“Always brassed up, ain’t he Blue J?” Percy’s voice is light, mocking as he calls Jon by his nickname, obviously eager to continue to break protocol once it’s snapped.

Macsen wants to warn against proper dialogue in the air, but Gaines seems unphased. “When over foreign territory, yes. Check your fuel.”

They each do as they are told, or so Macsen assumes because all pilots answer. He looks at his own. “half an hour of flight time,” he calls over. “Sparrow leader, what’s your fuel?”

“Worryin’ about your-"

“Hush, Jon. Sparrow 2, I’m at a quarter.”

His eyes look around them. There should be no mountains here, nothing to block their way back from the target. The mission had been somewhat of a success, despite their inability to spot the missing pilot even though they found his plane smoking in a field. Looking to his left, he sees Albert’s hurricane just scuffed up enough to show they’d had resistance, even with two sprogs between the group. “Fly smart,” he tells them, even if it is Gaines’ job to do so. “Save enough fuel for a possible fight. Save enough to make it back home.” He inspects Percy’s plane further, noting the boy is just off in ascension. “Make sure you don’t go too high or we may miss the pilot should we see him. Albert, keep yourself straight.”

“Copy that, Sparrow 2.”

“Yes, Sparrow 2.”

They are quiet for a while, flying in good sequence. Words between them are few and far between. Even with the relative calm, there is something tingling along Macsen’s spine, making him wary. Something isn’t right, and the silence only makes it worse. Then Albert decides to break it. “So, Sparrow Leader?”

“Yes Sparrow 5?”

“Why didn’t they just send our friends in France? Why waste men an’ fuel on some bloke lost in Belgium?”

Macsen frowns. He partly agrees. They weren’t exactly the closest to target, and it is a wonder that the Hurricanes would make it this far before they would need to possibly stop to refuel. The man wasn’t even apart of Church Fenton. Nothing about this mission makes sense, but these thoughts could not be their thoughts. No one says anything, however, letting Gaines think before the man replies, “The enemy had something to say about it. They’ve completely got our allies in France with their hands tied.” They are all quiet with the answer and then, as if summoned, something catches them off guard, a glint from below, a shadow from above. “Dammit! Messerschmitts!” Comes Gaines. “Break, damnit, break!” They each break formation, Macsen paying careful attention to Albert and Percy as they bank in opposite directions. Gaines goes up and away as a Messerschmitt takes aim.

“Sparrow 3, keep to your wingman and follow Sparrow 5,” Macsen orders, following behind Percy himself. From the corner of his eye, he sees Jon align with Albert. Gaines is attempting to down a hun when he notices another trailing behind Jon. “Watch for bandits!” Macsen calls, falling into a rhythm he hasn’t quite mastered. He is prepared, however, when a hun comes into his vision. It banks right, attempting to chase Percy.

Macsen eyes them carefully.

“He’s on my tail!” Percy calls, obvious panic in his tone. They had not expected a fight, not so soon.

“I’m coming on his,” Macsen says, voice calm as he approaches from behind the pair. The Messerschmitt bobs in and out, trying to take aim at a swerving Percy. Macsen bites his lip, attempting to get a clean shot. Then an idea comes to him. “When I tell you to, Sparrow 4, you bank hard right. Understand?” There is no answer. “Percy-”

“Yes.” It is shaky, but it is a reply. “Yes, I hear you Sparrow 2.”

He watches them, following closer and closer behind as he attempts to align his shot with one of the Messerschmitt’s wings. Percy maneuvers in and out, keeping the hun from taking aim. Macsen sees a chance.

“One.” He can nearly hear Percy’s heart over the com.

“Two.” The hun is closer, lining his own shot. If he misses -

“Bank!” Suddenly Percy’s hurricane takes a sharp turn to the right. The hun follows, pulling into Macsen’s line of sight. He waits, only a few seconds of ammo left and suddenly fires towards the fuselage. There is a beat where he forgets to breathe until it ignites in smoke. It continues chase a second more before, defeated, the hun breaks away. Percy calls over the com to tell Macsen thanks, but he doesn’t really hear it. Instead, he watches the smoking plane as it dives towards the earth. “Come on, bail,” he murmurs. “Bail damn you. You won’t make it back-” But the plane slams into the snow below, a burst of red and metal igniting in the field.

For a moment, he is frozen. His body is automatically keeping himself and his Hurricane flying. Then-

“Sparrow 2, what the bloody hell are you doing? Get to your wingman, now!” Gaines’ voice breaks him from his thoughts, forcing Macsen to mutter an apology. A heavy pit sits in his chest as he levels out and looks around them, trying to find Percy. As he does, he notices the young lad chasing another hun.

“I’m coming, Sparrow 4,” Macsen calls, trying to eye just how many they were up against as he lurches his Hurricane forward to catch up to Percy. He notices the same one Gaines had gotten limping away, smoke trailing behind it. There is another that pulls behind him then, and there is still the same one that attempts to get Jon. Albert chases it, but the trio weave in and out together. He grits his teeth. “Two down. Two to go.”

**RAF Church Fenton**  
**14 May 1940**

He’s just returned from a short leave to town when he notices the planes gone.

“Lewis, please-"

“Where did you send them, Charles,” Richard demands, voice on the verge of shaking despite being in front of Wing Command, breaking protocol.

If not for the older man’s history with Richard’s father, Wing Commander Folton would’ve more than likely threatened demotion. “Sit _down_ Richard, before you hurt yourself.” Richard doesn’t comply, causing more wrinkles on Folton’s head. The old man sighs. “Listen, Lewis,” he begins, returning to some sort of order whilst still trying to be a fatherly figure, “They’ve got Gaines, Hastings, and Ingram with them. Stop worrying about your sprogs.”

Richard tilts his head, opening his mouth to say something, but doesn’t. A second more passes before he speaks. “I’m not worried about the seasoned fliers, sir. I’m worried about the fact that you sent two sprogs with an incomplete flight for a tracking sortie. In Belgium.” He grits the last bit out, trying to convey how dangerous and ridiculous such a thing was. “Burton and Price-"

“Are well enough on their own, Lewis. They’re both well trained for men just out of university. Give them a chance.” The look Folton gives him is hard and telling, one Richard knows all too well.

He crosses his arms. Tries to dig a bit deeper. “Why didn’t you send out the rest of the squadron? You’ve got entire sections of men itching to go up. Why didn’t you—”

“Why didn’t I wait? Because none of you would have been able to fly anyway, Lewis. Most of the squadron is on leave till tomorrow, and the others are out with their Hurricanes down for repairs.” Folton, already done with the conversation, with the argument, begins thumbing through files. “I don’t know why you’re even asking me this.”

It’s obviously his nerves, Richard thinks, but says nothing. Instead, he sighs out, dramatic and overdrawn, to show his impatience. “The air’s too thick for a tracking sortie, Charles,” he says, low for just the two of them to hear, in case someone might be just outside the door. “The Germans—”

Folton runs a tired hand over his face, moving his glasses just up the bridge of his nose. “Your birds will come back to you soon enough, Lewis. Now please, go take a walk on.”

Richard’s ears tinge red with something between embarrassment and shame, his mouth clamping shut the moment _your birds_ leaves Folton’s mouth. With another sigh, Richard simply nods and gives a curt apology. With reluctance, he salutes and removes himself from the makeshift office. He walks past the Air Control, trying hard to ignore the women as they speak and move pegs. He sighs when he steps into the Fenton air.

For a moment, he swears he feels something ominous in the distance, a shiver along his spine, before swallowing it down and walking on.

**RAF Church Fenton**  
**14 May 1940 (A Few Hours Later)**

He first hears of their return from one of the others in 504.

Richard takes no time in running from the distraction of the briefing room the moment he hears the vibrating hum of the Hurricanes. He hurries to throw his jacket around his shoulders, forgetting the belt as the rest of 504 Squadron follow behind. _Late_ , he believes he will chastise, _you’re bloody well late_. But he never gets the chance.

“What in Christ—” Richard’s voice catches in his throat as he notices two things horribly wrong with the image in front of him: each of the hurricanes are sporting battle scars that they shouldn’t have, and where five planes had gone up, now there are only four.

Something cold, hard, and heavy shivers in him then, noticing Gaines, Hastings, Burton, and Price each step out of their planes as the ground crew sets chocks beneath their wheels. They have the looks of men who have sacrificed something for a greater good, and Richard must steady himself where he stands. Where on earth was Macsen?

It’s Gaines who meets his eyes first.

“Thomas-“

But it’s when Gaines looks away that tells Richard everything. The older man, their Squadron Leader, has failed. There is a broken sob to his right, and it’s Percy Burton who has dropped to his knees. Young and ever-optimistic, the lad loved Macsen to no bounds, and no doubt he couldn’t give two shits about mourning the man who had taught him patience in the air in the public of their squadron.

Richard takes one long breath, eyes following Hastings and Price as they try to lift Burton from the ground. The other pilots of 504 who have come out to congratulate the lot of them say nothing, bowing their heads as they look on, sympathetic. This would be their first major loss. They pat Burton on the back as he passes, leaning on Price and silently weeping.

Unable to really find his footing, Richard turns and ignores a few fervent calls after him, more than likely Hastings or Mitchell. No doubt he’ll be scolded later by someone because division mates needed to stick together when losing one of their own, damnit, but he couldn’t really care less at the moment. His feet take him, of course, to his shared quarters with Macsen, where the others will come later in time.

He closes the door behind him, trying to catch his breath as he looks at Macsen’s empty cot. Beneath it are books, stacked neatly thanks to Macsen’s need for tidiness and a crate of some of his personal effects. The sheets are made, having just been cleaned the night before, and along the tiny shelf they shared is a photograph they’d taken together, against Macsen’s wishes, and another secret picture of Richard that Macsen seemed to favor.

For a moment, none of it is real. Macsen is just in the mess, not ready to come to write his log yet, still chastising Burton for a careless rush into battle with a Messerschmitt. For a moment Richard imagines that Macsen will burst through the door at any second, smelling of those disgusting Jig’s he smoked and cologne. He will quietly smile, give Richard a kiss right along his jaw in the secret of their rare privacy, and then get to his cot to read the same damned book again. But it all comes crashing down suddenly around him when his eyes catch something beneath Macsen’s pillow, it’s corner just jutting out. With trembling hands, Richard carries himself over to it, to sit on the empty cot and pull out what he learns is a smaller book of poetry.

It had been a small treasure Macsen had allowed himself on one of their leaves to the village. Richard keeps it open on the page Macsen had left it, and an ache coats his ribs when he reads the small poem on the left-hand side.

_You were beautiful_  
_In every way_  
_Possible and Impossible._

Beneath the poem, written in Macsen’s beautiful hand, are the words ‘ _tell Richard_.’ For some reason, this makes the loss of him hurt more. It means that Macsen had intended to return after this mess. He had intended to return to tell Richard this obnoxiously romantic sap.

Tears, hot and heavy, threaten to come out of his eyes in shameless droves, but he bites his lip, keeping them in. Crying means accepting that Macsen is dead. Instead, Richard falls to his side, curling into himself with as much force as he can, hoping to disappear. He buries his nose into Macsen’s pillow, clutching the book to his chest. The smell of Macsen envelops him, but the absence of him leaves Richard blinking into the stale air, clutching at ghosts as he mourns, tearless, for what feels like an eternity.

Suddenly his hand grazes something beneath him, and when he lifts it from under the pillow, he recognizes a journal. His heart stills for a moment. He wipes a stray tear with the back of his sleeve and looks at the thing in his hands.

Richard has seen it before, either on the desk in Macsen’s room or neatly pressed into the corner of a table.

He asks himself if he should read it. If it would be walking into someone else’s life without their permission.

But no one is here to tell him otherwise.

He peeks into it, opening it to a page with a name he had not expected.


	2. Zulu

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Do you remember the first time I called you darling?

> __/_/__
> 
> _Mother,_
> 
> _I hope you are well. Lately I am reminded of you when speaking to my closest friend of literature. I think of your garden and of your books. I think of your furrowed brow and the constant mumbling as you find a print error on the page. I smell the dust of old leaves. I feel the cold rustle of the birch trees at the edge of the wood, tall and white and oh, so gold. Do you ever wish I were a novella? An old classic you could mark up with a pen? Although I am not one of your books, something to be fixed, I do believe you would be proud of my friends. Richard I think you would like most of all. He is the perfect son you always wanted, the warm evening you always dreamed of. When the war is over, he will marry a good, Christian girl, just as you had hoped. He will have four children, two boys and two girls, and all will be pilots rather than farmers. He will grow old with his wife and creak like the birch trees in the wind as he walks slowly to his church every Sunday. Yes, he is everything you ever wanted in a son, and despite it I do not hate him. No. The only fault you’ll find in him is my affection for him. ~~I love him.~~ ~~Am in love with him.~~ ~~I love him the way the moon loves the sun.~~ ~~I can look and long and mourn my solitude but never will I be allowed to have. I am the lone birch tree that never turned gold, reaching out my branches towards the warmth of the star, of the thing that gives me life unknowingly, unconditionally. Yes, I love him, and you will have to forgive him for that.~~ How are your friends? How are you? Here is all well. Gaines is getting antsy with oncoming war, and Jon, the bloke I mentioned before in the last letter, is still trying to find himself a girl. None of that for me, though. Please write back when you can. I will be expecting your letters._
> 
> _Your Son,_
> 
> _Macsen_

Richard blinks. The weight of the cot beneath him is suddenly very present. Macsen had rarely talked about his mother in a good light. The fact that he has written to her is baffling. Stranger still that he has asked about her well being and shared information about himself, about _him,_ to someone he supposedly hated. Running his hand along the blanket of the cot, Richard wonders for a moment about the supposed letters Macsen was waiting to receive. He’d no idea that the man wrote to anyone aside from his landlord. Re-reading the letter, what sticks our more in his mind, then, is what is said on his own future. He wants to scoff at Macsen choosing a life for him, as if there is no other way it could be lived. It makes him nervous, makes his hands clammy. Reminds Richard of the things his father told him before he left for England. He swallows. Continues to the next page.

__/_/__

_Zulu,_

He pauses. Blinks. Looking around himself, Richard decides that stooping over the letters is not so proper. Instead, he leans back against the wall, crossing one ankle over the other. Looking down, he presses the paper, the book, between his hands. His thumb runs along the page. He rereads his name again, taking a breath.

_Zulu,_

> _Do you remember that time in Brickfort’s class when you dropped his box of chalk and most of it shattered? I had never seen someone dissolve so quickly. You were a tangle of sorry and regret. Later on, I asked you about it, and you were reluctant to explain your father’s harsh need for perfection._

Richard looks up for a moment, trying to find the memory in the walls of the barracks. The day was a stain on his time at Cranwell, where Brickfort pointed out this mistake, the class of boys poked fun, and Macsen had quietly asked him why he was so shot over it all. That had been the only good thing, apart from a decent lunch. Sighing, Richard goes to finish the letter.

> _So often while I am out here, among such violent talk, among an actual war, I think of how you would adapt. What would you think of the rot filled air, of the smoke with your feathery lungs? Of the soiled, gray sun with your delicate skin? Of the blood with your feminine hands? Your mother’s hands._

A flush touches his cheeks at the mention of his hands, and he eyes them. They’d been a constant object of both Macsen’s compliments and taunts from his father.

> _Your piano fingers long and lithe? Then again, you are a farmer’s child. Maybe you will not be so breakable with dirty hands and chapped lips. No. It is your heart that would not be able to suffer it. To endure it. One accident would ruin you forever. Would surely get you killed. And war, she is a cruel mistress. And she has no such room for apologies._
> 
> _Yours,_
> 
> _Macsen_

His ears go hot at the thought of Macsen seeing him so weak. Clenching his jaw, Richard nearly tosses the book aside, but something else stirs in him. It is a fluttering, and he believes it to be giddiness. Contentedness. His eyes flicker over the parts about his hands again, of the poetic language Macsen used when describing a part of himself he’d been taught to loathe. An ache, familiar but new, threatens to come back. As he reads, he feels as though Macsen is speaking to him now, can imagine Macsen pressing hands to his own under the mess table in secret. He huffs, feeling tears prick at his eyes, stopping them just in time. Sliding down and turning onto his side, Richard reads the next.

> __/_/__
> 
> _Father,_
> 
> _I think of you often, especially when I go up. I feel the plane rattle around me, her metal body shuttering to life and groaning with me in every turn. I always imagine you with me, in my ear or on the wing. I think often of my childhood, of flying with you and learning all that you taught me. I remember the day you left us. It was not like any other day, though you tried so hard to make it seem so. But maybe sons can feel when their fathers are about to die, when they die. ~~Did you dive straight for the water? Fake engine failure?~~ They said there was no blood, but I believe you would have liked to watch the sky as you went. It is what you always told me._

Richard sighs, stopping as if to pay some sort of respect to this deceased father and the grief Macsen must have felt. Though there is an obvious inconsistency in Macsen’s letters, it is clear to Richard that maybe Macsen wrote them as he saw fit. Closing his eyes, he wonders how he would feel if he’d lost his father if he’d had any sort of memory at all like the ones Macsen seemed to treasure. Prepared to read on, Richard hopes he can find some sort of answer.

> _Though mother never believed you when you told us that is how you would die, in a plane, a fine old girl from the war. I believe I always knew. Is it right that I call her that? Mother? She’ll have nothing to do with me and my lot but my only victory over her seems to be my calling her a title she renounced._

Again, he pauses. Nothing made sense about the earlier letter, though he guesses this renouncing, as Macsen called it, could have happened after the letter he’d written to her. Perplexed, he continues.

> _Maybe I should think less of it as a victory and more of a connection. This is something else that Gaines has taught me. Never to be spiteful. As pilots so much of our lives is lived by the second. We have none to waste on such things. Take no offense, but I wonder if it is Gaines who teaches me more about life. You only ever taught me about war, about planes, about the only things you really knew, because war does that to you. Consumes you . Makes you know nothing else. I understand now why you trembled at night, why you would grit your teeth and hide during the light shows. Now I know why you would startle at a gunshot or fidget when you couldn’t go up. Now I understand._
> 
> _Your Son,_
> 
> _Macsen_

Not knowing much about Macsen’s father, he remembers vaguely that there’d been mention of the man serving in the Great War, but Richard had never known he was a pilot. In some strange way, Richard feels as though he is connected to Macsen’s father on a level that only men in war could be. Though he’d not had much of anything by way of actual dog fight he knows that they’d all been on edge since the first invasion of Poland. Of course, they’d barely gotten any decent flight time, with only patrols to keep them occupied, but just as quickly as it had come did the German threat stop. It sat there, festering, with little more than skirmishes before, out of nowhere, did Germany begin its unforeseen move after months of nothing.

 _Blitzkrieg,_ if he remembers the term correctly.

At the thought of this, Richard is brought back to his own reality. He is ripped from the past to be reminded that he is at war, that his friends were at war, and that war had taken-

No. He could not think this way. War had taken from him and the others, but it had not taken Macsen. He refuses to believe it. His own tunic feels too heavy for him, as if suddenly suffocating, so he strips it off and tosses it at his feet. Then he switches sides and continues on.

__/_/__

_Zulu,_

> Himself, again. A smile touches his lips _._
> 
> _Do you remember the first time we met Percy? How young he was then. How invincible yet afraid. He was so starry-eyed, too in awe of the metal beasts he would control. Do you remember when he was being strung around? No one really knew where he would go, always jumping from division to division, and the Crane division is hardly kind to such soft sprogs. Do you remember the 5 th of June? Gaines came storming across the tarmac. He found myself, you, and Jon defending Percy, who sat on his arse concealing a bloody nose. You remember how he found us, don’t you? Jon had a split lip but had Tommy on the ground. You had a black eye yourself, the back of Jim’s collar bunched in your fist. I had one boot on old Croaker’s neck, my other hand holding up James by his throat. People knew better than to fight the Sparrow division, but apparently, they didn’t take too kind to Jon calling them all cowards. We were all grounded for a week, but Folton knew we were defending that little dove. ‘He’s yours now,’ he had told us, and he was slightly peeved we hadn’t gotten those boys court marshaled. ‘Now he’s a sparrow.’ But we all know how Percy really is. More of a pup than a bird, at least on the ground. Always following us, especially Albert once he came back from his leave. I know he will probably blame himself for anything that happens to any of us. He’ll say he flew too low or forgot to check one of our planes, but we all know it is merely inevitable in this business. I hope we can help him get over that. War does not always have time for such softness._
> 
> _Yours,_
> 
> _Macsen_

There is that line again, or rather, that observation. Richard hums. The memory had come back to him quickly, is soft, hazy visions. He remembers the tussle. He remembers the punches thrown and the sudden, quick change in Macsen that none of them had ever seen before. Not really.

Steps outside catch his attention. His body tenses, and Richard prepares to pretend to be asleep. However, a knock never comes; no one comes to check in on him. For some reason, he is relieved. Curling a bit tighter, reads the next, only partly surprised that, again, his name appears at the top of the page.

> __/_/__
> 
> _Zulu,_
> 
> _Do you remember the first time I called you darling? You were so shy then, laughing with rosy cheeks as you and all the others thought I was mocking you. To be honest, I was so elated to be able to call you that and not be found out, that I continued to call you such at whichever moments I found I could. I was too blinded by such joy to see how much it hurt you then, as you believed I was making fun of your slender figure, your feathery laugh, your sweet hair, your beautiful hands. Oh love, how wrong you were then, but I was the greater fool. I never meant to hurt you, but as I took liberty in my own selfish desire to call you by pet names, I never fully understood the slight frown of your eyes. I could never comprehend just how deep the ache of your father’s nature ran through you. I could never fathom that he would try to beat any part of your mother out of you as he attempted to turn you into a farmer, as he attempted to make your hands into worker’s hands. Into a man’s hands. Did you become a pilot to show him that it takes both strong and delicate hands to maneuver such a lady in the air? Or did you simply do it to try and feel as light as a bird being shot at in spring? I’ll never be able to repay you for forgiving me. You are the warmth I never knew I could want. You are the ache I never knew I could deserve._
> 
> _Yours,_
> 
> _Macsen_

At this, Richard stops. He is crying without realizing it, the pillow beneath him wet. Over and over again, he rereads one line: _You are the ache I never knew I could deserve._

“You fool,” he says aloud, though he doesn’t really know who he is speaking to. He rereads the letter several times, wishing that he could hear Macsen say these words to him. Though he is not unused to the shower of compliments in their more private moments, he merely treated them as…he doesn’t really know. He closes his eyes and starts to hate himself. How could he know how much Macsen cared for him but not really _know?_ How could he go day in and day out with men, coming closer to them than even lovers were to each other as they got deeper and deeper into the birth of war, and not feel the intensity of everything? How could he not recognize the way Macsen looked at him? The way he tensed when others got too close?

How could he not understand his own feelings, whatever they might be?

He thinks of his father, of what he might say. He thinks of the way Macsen had picked up so quickly on how negatively his father had impacted his life.

He thinks of the sort of affection he craved all because he had been denied it for so long.

Richard rubs his temple, as he does not have an answer. It is a sorry excuse, but he doesn’t recognize the ache nor the flutter that rests in his ribs, all at once, like a wounded bird trying to get out.

All he can do is close his eyes, pray that when he wakes up, all of this will just be a nightmare. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quicker update than I had anticipated, but I was able to dedicate some time to this next part. Of course, all comments/feedback/critique is welcome. Also, I would like to apologize if this is in any way, shape, or form hard to understand. It is much easier to read when I am able to change the font of the 'letters' to look handwritten, but I don't know if I can do that through Ao3. In an attempt to help clarify which parts are letters, I italicized and block quoted them. If anyone has any suggestions, please share them! They will be greatly appreciated! 
> 
> I hope you are all having a wonderful day.


	3. The Sparrow and the Hawk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first time my mother told me she loved me, she was reciting lines from an old Austen novel.

Church Fenton, Leeds

7 February, 1939

_The moon is an unpolished pearl the first time Richard catches a glimpse of the infamous Sparrow._ _At least, he thinks it’s the first time. Rum and pips have smoothed over the young blonde’s speech, making him seem braver than he really is. When he approaches the older man with a bravado he did not possess, a single slurred thought runs through his head_ : I’m gonna make him love me _. It is a foreign thing, a ghost of a thing, really, but Richard is not leaving this bar with the nickname ‘Chicken’ under his collar. No, Richard knows that he will make the unmovable_ _‘Sparrow’ of the upper class love him more than he loved himself. It is his dream to be among the best, to be friends with the best, and by God-_

_“You alright lad?” A shock of blue surprises him when the blonde looks into a gaze of amused worry. It takes him a moment to realize that it is the figure of his thoughts who has spoken to him, setting his glass of whiskey down on the bar. The other officer, some older gent that looks a lot like his squadron leader, if fuzzy memory serves correct, looks on with his own amusement, then smiles upon recognition._

_“Ah, Macsen, this is-”_

_“Pilot Officer Richard Gerald Lewis,” Richard states, sticking out his hand in stiff bravery. He gives a cheeky grin, not bothering to catch the few eyes that have decided to watch this spectacle._

_Macsen quirks a dark brow. “Nice to meet you, Lewis,” he says, his voice smooth as a Sunday drive as he grips Richard’s hand in a firm shake. “Name’s Macsen Elian Ingram. This here is our Squadron Leader, Thomas Gaines.” He looks over to him, “but you’ve no doubt met.”_

_Like a love-struck dove, Richard is too in awe of the man before him to act like anything but a hazy fool. He is grounded in the handshake, in the solidity of Macsen. Gaines smirks at them. He leans against the bar, sipping his own drink as he speaks. “This here is that lad I was telling you about, Ingram. The South African kit that’s to replace Berkley.”_

_Richard sees the two men exchange a glance, and he frowns at the shared secret between them. “Not nice tah keep secrets among friends,” he slurs, pretending to be more drunk than he would care to admit, as being in the midst of an upcoming icon like the great Macsen Ingram has sobered him up fairly quickly. And he is sure that his new squadron mates behind him, who signed him up for this entire thing in the first place, are snickering at him. There is no doubt in his mind that they will surely mock him for the rest of the week._

_But at least they can’t call him ‘chicken.’_

_Both Macsen and Gaines again share a glance, and the infamous one leans against the bar himself, seeming to relax suddenly. He takes his drink into his hand and downs its contents in one graceful glide. “I’m glad to see we’re friends so quickly then,” he comments, voice somehow strangely kind. He is not prissy or stuck up as the lads at Cranwell seemed to make him believe, and Richard is happily surprised to find himself ease as well._

_He gives a lopsided grin, showing off his slightly crooked teeth. “Must hang with the greats to be great,” he says, then stuffs a hand into this pocket as he sips his rum and pips with the other. “You’ll know me for more than just being a transfer soon as those new planes come in.”_

_This makes Macsen smirk. “Come down from Oxford, have you?”_

_“Cranwell.”_

_“Ah,” Macsen takes a long swig of another glass of whiskey, which has been delivered to him without Richard’s notice. His eyes have been looking at Macsen’s calm, warm face the entire time._

_“And you?” He asks, suddenly embarrassed, as though all those long hours amount to nothing in comparison._

_Macsen gives a sheepish grin, one of Richard’s first he will ever see. “Cranwell.”_

_Richard has to struggle not to drop his drink. His mouth hangs open. “You’re joking. But I don’t –” He bites his tongue. He doesn’t quite remember having ever met Macsen, not really. He barely remembers a man with dark hair, with blue eyes who he couldn’t name. He remembers something, a stolen kiss in the gray light. He barely gets out, “Did you graduate this year?”_

_“No,” laughs Gaines, and it is obvious from the other two pilot’s reactions that they are used to this. The older man claps Macsen on the back. “No, this one left in ’38 and went on with me. Chasing those Spits thinking my squadron might get them.”_

_The Sparrow shrugs. “I love planes, but those Hurricanes are so sluggish.”_

_Gaines rolls his eyes. “You and your Spits.”_

_They seem to be trailing off without Richard, as if they are picking up on the conversation the blonde had so rudely interrupted. This makes him feel sheepish himself. His mind is wrapped around his memory still, of the senior that had him tucked in his pocket, and he almost turns to leave, until Macsen speaks up. “So, do you like how the Hurricanes handle, Lewis?”_

_Richard perks up a little too much and a little too obviously. He settles right back in. “Oh, I love them. They’re so smooth in their landing too.”_

_“Aye, but they’re a bitch in the air,” pipes Macsen, and as if he has noticed that Richard has finished his rum and pips before Richard himself has, he turns to the bartender. “Another for my friend here, Corks.” Macsen turns back, then quirks a brow at the surprised face Richard gives. “What?”_

_The blonde shrugs then sets his empty glass on the bar. “S’nothing. Thanks.”_

_As he receives his drink, the three of them easily fall into a conversation on planes and the new batch of pilot officers rolling in with the Hurricanes and Spitfires. As they talk, Richard tries to take mental notes in his mind. It is obvious that Gaines has known Macsen a while. Macsen had been graduated and in his squadron by the time Richard had left Cranwell to transfer to no. 12 group. During this time, young pilots around them talk and dance and try to pull Richard away on several occasions, but he will not be deterred. He has fallen into the ring of the Sparrow and the Hawk, now all he has to do is earn his place. There is a part of him that wonders when he will know that, and he assumes it will be when he has shown them what he can do in the sorties they will have in the coming days. Most pilots only truly earn their trust in the air, or so he has been told._

_“-war on the rise, Ingram. It is only inevitable.”_

_Richard comes into the conversation with a frown. “War, sir?”_

_Gaines gives a solemn nod. “Yes. That Hitler fellow talks a lot about power. I don’t like the way he speaks.”_

_Macsen has lost the warm calm he once held before and quietly agrees. Richard and the others have heard the murmurs of oncoming war amongst the senior fliers and teachers, but he had never really assumed that it was a real threat. There is something in the way that Macsen and Gaines look at their glasses, however, that settles over Richard like an ominous fog. He speaks up. “You don’t think he’s just smooth-talking?”_

_Their leader scoffs. “This one here is a smooth talker,” he says, jiving a thumb in Macsen’s direction. “What that Hitler fellow is doing is winning favor in the idea of another war. Even though his country is still healing from the scars of its last failure.”_

_The slightest tint of hurt passes through Macsen’s gaze, and it does not go unnoticed by Richard. Macsen heaves a great sigh and begins to pull something from the breast pocket of his tunic. “I need a Jig,” he states, then presses one to the tip of his lips. Gaines seems to nod and drinks his whiskey down in one gulp. Neither man seem even tipsy, though Richard is sure they have had more than he has, and they begin to walk towards a back exit. Richard feels as though he has been pushed out; it seems only the older pilots can speak of war. Then, “You coming Lewis?” Macsen’s voice pulls him from his thoughts, as he is turned and has another inviting expression._

_There is a moment of pause where the blonde just stares at the man before him. Gaines is already out the door, leaving it open for the pair. The world seems to stop, and Richard wonders if the rum is finally getting to him. He swallows, noticing all of the eyes staring. Parts of his mind race, telling him to hurry and answer. To not be a fool. But Macsen is oddly patient, his expression unchanging as he waits calmly, one hand in his pocket and the other hanging limp at his side. The Jig sits between his perfect, white teeth, and the shock of his blue eyes is light in its gaze._

_Suddenly the blonde snaps out of it, and Richard nods. “Not a smoker, but I could use the air, sure.” He downs his drink and sets it beside the other empty glasses._

_Macsen smiles at him then. “You sure you’re alright Lewis?” he asks as he puts a hand to Richard’s shoulder and leans in. His dark hair, blacker than oil, hangs partially in his face, and Richard notices that he smells wonderfully of leather and tobacco._

_The blonde swallows, feeling the heat of Macsen’s touch spread through his clothes and pierce him right to his spine. He has definitely felt this before, but he doesn’t know where. “Yes, I think it’s all the hot air,” he tries, hoping he does not look like a boy about to wet himself. Macsen nods and immediately removes his hand, allowing it to go back to his side. As he turns, Richard stares at the same hand which nearly broken him and swears he can see it flinch in the slightest – a comfortable stretch. It is all so quick and over with that the blonde wonders if it has really happened. Without a word, Richard wakes himself up and, giving a cheery wink to his mates who stare at him in wide-eyed wonder, follows his senior outside. No doubt he has made a legend of himself already._

RAF Church Fenton

15 May, 1940

It’s hours before any of the others return, smelling of alcohol and waking Richard up with the mere heaviness of their strides. As they pass him, they say nothing about Richard being limp in Macsen’s bed. Out of respect and not really giving a damn, Richard makes no comment himself when Burton climbs into Price’s cot, curled up at his side though small the cot may be. And he is jealous at the two of them, and he wonders if their affection is anything close to his and Macsen’s. Hastings too is quiet as he climbs in his own cot, murmuring for Burton to know ‘it’s goin’ to be alright.’

For a long time, Richard keeps his breathing even as he listens for what might be approaching steps, anything to help warn the two men if they need it. He doesn’t know when he sleeps, if he sleeps at all, but it is later still before he forces himself to close his eyes, to relax. He grips the journal harder, bringing it closer to his chest as he tries to recall what he had read.

By the morning, Burton and Hastings are still curled into each other for sanctuary, and Price’s hand is awkwardly laid out across the space between their beds. Richard is very much aware that he is alone, wishing he could have the luxury of not knowing what is happening. But he can’t. He is all too aware of Macsen’s absence, and after a moment longer, forces his legs over the bed. He needs a smoke. Shivering at the morning chill, Richard steps into the air to maybe catch a breath, unsurprised to find Gaines just outside on the stoop, smoking a Vee.

Wordless, Richard sits beside him and takes the cigarette when it’s offered. They smoke together, saying nothing. Richard knows that Gaines will speak in his own time, but for a while, they just sit, sucking in as much heat from the Vee’s that they can as the gray, colorless sky above them shifts with the oncoming light.

They are on their fourth cigarette each by the time Gaines finally says something. “Went down over Ypres,” he says, staring out at the memory of it. “Caught us and his rudder flap was shot up with holes.” He takes a long drag. “Made a land in a field. Meant to circle him, to watch him land, but he told us to fly on. Told us to get to France to refuel, to get Burton and Price safe.”

Gaines will not cry, Richard knows, and he doesn’t blame him for it, just as he does not blame him for not waiting. “He would tell you to leave, the righteous bastard.”

The older man huffs. “His engine was in smoke when he went down, but Ingram was pretty sure he would be fine.”

The _would be’s_ scare Richard, making the chill in his bones colder than anything the morning air might cause him. “What do you mean?” he asks carefully, not trusting his own voice.

Gaines says nothing at first, seeming to test his own memory before he finds what he’s searching for. “When Ingram went down, he was confident he would land with ease. I told him where we were, told him to mark it on the map, to head to Arras where we would wait and he said he would…well…” Gaines takes another long drag of his smoke, letting the breath of it out into the air like confronting a ghost. “Shots rang out suddenly, from nowhere, as Ingram kept circling to descend.” He shakes his head. “Then nothing. No call. No answer. No reply.”

“Did you see it?” Richard begins, unable to really form the word.

“No, but we didn’t see a chute either.” He sighs. “I know he was out of ammo when he went down. I think they got the fuselage too.” Gaines looks at him then, eyes hard and apologetic. They tell Richard that there is little hope that Macsen has survived.

Richard refuses to accept it. “He’s better than that, Thomas,” he says, voice reluctant of the truth. “Macsen would never—”

“Listen, Richard—”

“No. He’s isn’t gone for grief, s _ir,_ ” Richard argues, shaking away informality. “Stop. He made a safe landing. I _know_ he did. He could do it in his sleep. His antenna mast could’ve broken, or maybe he was just focused on—”

A hand on his shoulder stops him, brings him back to the present as he realizes he’s trembling. Gaines simply gives Richard a light squeeze before rising to take his leave. Without turning around he adds, “If our Sparrow is as tough as you say him to be, Richard, then we’ll have word of him before the end of the week. But if he isn’t…” He pauses just to toss a spent Vee at his feet, crushing it under his boot. “You pick out what you want to keep before you send his stuff off.”

Richard is quiet as he watches Gaines leave, and he remains long after the man has become nothing but a blurry memory. Questions run through his mind. How long had they _really_ waited after they’d refueled? Why hadn’t they waited more? He is numb from the chill, hands shivering like ice in his pockets. If Macsen were here, he would scold Richard into his cot where he would warm those hands between his own.

_‘You’ve never been good with the Fenton air, have you?You get rashes, Rich’,_ he would tell him, pressing quiet kisses along his knuckles. ‘ _Why do you do this every time?’_

And Richard would just shrug, lie and say he got carried away again. But of course, Macsen knows it to be a rouse. Macsen knows that Richard enjoys the caring, just as much as Macsen enjoys giving it.

He is a mess, after all, and without Macsen there to keep him in check, he would just flounder like a plane without her rudder flap.

It isn’t until he hears the sounds of waking from inside the other bunks that he forces himself up, already rubbing his hands together to prepare for the day. When he goes in, he is greeted by Burton, Hastings, and Price looking at him from their side of the bunk, dressed and waiting, expecting.

Richard gives a wry smile. “If you think I’m going to yell at the three of you, then you’re wrong.” He turns to remove his jacket and trousers to be replaced by his dress blues, changing just for the sake of keeping himself busy. “It wasn’t your faults.”

He hears Burton shuffle, probably wanting to say something, but then Hastings gives an audible ‘hush’ before simply replying with, “We’re sorry we couldn’t wait any longer, Lewis. We’re sorry.”

Richard won’t look at them, can’t. He simply nods, eyes focusing on the book of poetry he had left in Macsen’s cot. “I know,” he murmurs, cutting the conversation short.

Hastings, having more time with Richard than either of the sprogs, understands this telling sign and escorts himself and the others out of the bunk. Richard waits until he can no longer hear their steps before he lets out a shaking breath and forces himself to finish dressing. Once or twice he stills, letting a few tears slip past his façade, but he ends up finishing before the first call goes out for inspection.

By the time he arrives to the line, Hastings has finished worrying over Burton’s clothes, Price is rolling his eyes, and Gaines is standing proudly by the lot of them. The rest of 504 is trickling in with him, behind him, all of them dressed appropriately. Richard is able to fill the gap left for him with strained ease. There is another space just beside him, where Macsen would usually stand with a lazy smirk and a teasing gleam to his eye.

It’s empty now, and as Folton passes each man, he keeps his face neutral until he approaches Richard.

He opens his mouth as if to speak, but says nothing, only regarding the remnants of Sparrow division and Squadron 504 with the lightest face of sympathy before moving on. The rest of the time standing there goes on in prolonged silence as they wait for Folton to finish his rounds.

RAF Church Fenton

16 May 1940

It’s been two days since the incident when Richard slams the door in Folton’s face, praying he gets himself a demotion. As he passes the workers of Air Command, he notices that he has startled them from their work.

“What’s gotten you out of sorts?" asks Gaines, offering Richard a lukewarm cuppa once he approaches the lone leader in the mess.

Richard takes it with as much grace as he can muster, swinging a leg over the bench as he sits. “Won’t let us look for him,” he says, taking a sip just to keep up appearances. “Says the air is too tense. Says they won’t let anyone from No. 12 group go over there.” It stings more, knowing that men were over there dying, begging for help. 

Gaines rolls his eyes. “You know it is, Lewis. We’re all grounded here, especially with everything getting worse.” Sparrow leader gestures to all the other pilots in the mess, each of them in their own groups doing something to keep the buzz of adrenaline and shivers down. “Besides…I doubt—”

“That he survived?”

“Now Lewis, that isn’t what I meant.” Gaines gives Richard this hard look before turning back to his measly mix of eggs and bacon. “It’s only been a day or so, Lewis. And that’s—”

“That’s why we need to get him _home._ That long in enemy territory?” Richard puts his cuppa away, put off his tea. “Unthinkable.”

They say nothing more between them, Richard too itchy with worry to really focus on a decent conversation. He doesn’t notice more of 504 comes in not too long after, Hastings’, Price’s and Burton’s hands filled with trays of food. They sit at the table, Burton being the one to give Richard a look before taking his seat – Macsen’s seat - beside him.

Richard nods once he notices them, his body numb.

Burton takes it, though it’s obvious he is only doing it so no one is left out. _Macsen would want this,_ Richard thinks, then tears that thought from his mind. Thinking that way means believing that Macsen had died. And Macsen hasn’t died. _He is alive,_ Richard repeats, over and over like a mantra. _That soggy bastard is alive and probably charming some French twit --_

“—ichard? Richard? Did you hear me?”

He perks up at his name being called, stuttering an apology and squinting his eyes at the look Gaines gives him before turning back to Burton. “I’m sorry, Percy. What did you say?”

“I asked if you had any plans? For tomorrow? Maybe to your parents? We were promised weekend leave.” Percy’s voice is light, obviously scratchy from a night of crying. One hand holds his fork too tightly as the other clenches his thigh. It is obvious that he is trying to be strong.

Richard gives a sad smile. “No, Percy. I’ve got no family close enough for travel outside of Fenton.” Truth, albeit a bitter one. His family is back in South Africa, hopefully smiling at the sun no doubt, though his mother’s brow would be set in a forever frown. Even if they were close, he wouldn’t be in spirits to visit them anyway. “What about you?” This allows Richard to tune out the rest of the conversation as Burton goes on about his plans with his sister and father, who wait for him in town. Bitterly, Richard remembers that this will be another day alone, without Macsen by his side, since he first arrived at Fenton.

> ___/__/___
> 
> _Maybe I should not have come here. Surrounded by my books and the gathered dust, I am reminded of why I chose Fenton, Leeds in the first place. I see too much of my mother here. I am always reminded of my father. I constantly jitter about, tense as a coiled snake. They said his body washed up on Dover beach, but some childish part of me believes I will see him in the streets. I imagine him beneath a motor car, fixing problems he could never fix with himself, or even on the dock, oiling the wood of a small ship. Jon told me of his father’s abandonment. How he had the audacity to leave his family for another woman. Another life. Would it hurt less to know my father had done the same? Can it really be equal to throwing your old life away for nothing? Is it better to know he chose another family? Not death? Would I weep if I saw him alive or shoot him? But it is as Gaines taught me. What would violence for violence solve?_

RAF Church Fenton

16 May 1940 (Hours Later)

By the start of the afternoon, there is no word of Macsen from France. After Gaines had wrongly informed Macsen that the Air Component was stationed in Arras, the 504 had learned it had already moved to Hazebrouck. This had led to there being even less hope than before. Richard, however, could not let himself be disheartened.

“You’ve just got to accept it,” Gaines tells him, patting him on the shoulder.

Slowly, Richard sets down Macsen’s journal which he had written before Richard came to Fenton. It is a strange piece of intimacy that Richard feels he is stealing. “I can’t – I won’t, Thomas. Macsen—”

“Has been declared missing,” Gaines tells him. He eyes the old paper in Richard’s hands before attempting to thumb through his wife’s letters. “At least they didn’t strip him of his life, Lewis.” And he leaves him with that, heading towards the briefing room as he is not in the mood to waste one of his moments of peace on arguments.

Richard can’t really blame him. Burton, Hastings, and plenty of other men went out to the local town for a few hours of pub-hopping with their precious few days of leave. Some went home for a day or two, like Price, leaving men like Gaines and Richard behind.

_“If they call you,” Folton had told him, “then we’ll just stick two others on Sparrow division.”_

His mouth quirks at the thought of Burton or Hastings fussing over someone besides themselves being in their Hurricanes. Traits they’d acquired from Macsen, no doubt, who religiously checked on his Hurricane out on the tarmac, never trusting anyone other than himself in her pulpit. He would be cursing them, wishing he had a Spitfire instead.

_“And me?” Richard had asked him one spring evening when they’d grown lucky with no jobs or calls. “You think I’ll ever fly a Spit?”_

_Macsen had mulled this over carefully, seeming comfortable with their shoulders barely touching while they had sat comfortably on the grassy tarmac near their hangar. Macsen was eyeing their planes. “One day,” he had said. “One day you’ll fly her, Rich.” His voice had been soft, a caress in the still air. “And there will be nothing like it in the world.”_

Blinking away tears, he turns to the journal again.

> __/_/__
> 
> _Zulu,_
> 
> _The first time my mother told me she loved me, she was reciting lines from an old Austen novel. She had said the words in my direction, so I imagined it to be myself she directed such love and passion to. Her love to me had always been strict and uniform. It was a practiced love, a rehearsed love, but I guess it was a kind of love. Though her kindness was never a mother’s kindness, nor her love never a mother’s love, just as she would pretend, I was a character in one of her favorite novels to change, I would pretend she was a mother to me. I would imagine that she was only acting when she was cruel or apathetic but was herself when she was passionate or loving. Strange, is it not? I was born pretending, I live pretending, so too shall I die pretending. I wonder if that is why my father took his own life. Maybe he was tired of pretending that he did not have nightmares of the young men he killed. Maybe he was mixing the reality of his burned face with the fantasy that it was not an engine fire which caused it, but an accident of his childhood. His face had softened, a thick layer of mushy skin over the burn he gained in the war. He was not the daring hero my mother had married in her youth, and often I wonder if it was my birth that kept her to him, and him to her. Had they known that I could sense their unease, would they have remained? Would she have felt guilt for leaving him because of his scars, just as she felt guilt in abandoning me until she realized my sexuality? I do not know anymore. It was my father’s love which kept me. He saw me as the only good thing he had ever created in his life. I was his way of making up for all the deaths he caused, just as I was the cause for taking away the life my mother never got to have. I wonder if parents ever realize the sort of weight they put on their children._

A frown settles over him now, along with an ache in his chest. He doesn’t really feel as though he has any right to be so upset, not over someone he just shagged but - “Damnit.” Richard rubs his hands over his face and rises from his place on the stoop. He thinks a moment about bringing the journal inside but feels as though he cannot part with it, as if someone will take it with them should they see it on the bed. So, he decides instead to walk towards the briefing room, the journal tucked away under his arm. There is a sound coming from the center of the briefing room where a radio broadcast can be heard of some ol chap telling a good story about spirits.

His eyes immediately find Gaines in his usual spot in the corner, sipping on tea while staring at the letters from his wife. It is unsettling to see the room so empty. Richard steps heavily towards Gaines, letting the man know he was there. Gaines, however, doesn’t lift his eyes when Richard sits across from him, but what he says warrants a stilled breath from Richard’s throat. “Thinking about retiring the name ‘Sparrow,’” he says, without so much as a quiver to his voice. “With 504’s permissions, of course.”

Richard is oddly put off. “And what about me?”

Now Gaines looks at him over the rims of his glasses. “You won’t want to keep it. Not without your _Spatz._ ” He takes another sip of his tea. “Besides, we can hardly call ourselves Sparrow Division without our actual Sparrow.” The younger pilot says nothing, ducking his head as a sinking feeling fills his gut. Then Gaines says something else that hurts him even more. “They’ll be sending off a telegram for him missing if you want to send a letter to Tilly.”

Richard eyes him. “You know about -” Then the question feels stupid.

“Of course I know about her. More of a mother than the bag he has at that wretched house.” Gaines’ tone is thick with hate for the woman Richard had barely heard of, and he is slightly jealous at the thought that Macsen would tell Gaines more about his mother than he would him.

_Then again,_ he thinks, _all I ever did allow him was a shag._ He sighs after a moment, looking at his hands. Suddenly he feels hollow, unreal in his suddenly too tight uniform. He would close his eyes, maybe nap, but all he sees is a dead Macsen leaning over the stick of his Hurricane or frozen hard in a field of grass. Taking a shaky breath, he tries to focus on the words tumbling out of his mouth. “It feels like defeat, don’t you think?”

“Aye, it does, but sometimes we have to take our beatings and move on.” Gaines folds one letter to open another. His voice is that of a gentle father, a tenderness Richard has yet to get used to. “That’s war, Lewis.” Now Gaines gives him his eyes. “That’s war.”


	4. Post Office Telegram

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He will not die so easily.

> **POST OFFICE**
> 
> **TELEGRAM**
> 
> **24 AIR MINITSTRY ++ CONFIDENTIAL +191145**
> 
> **PRIORITY STOP TO OFFICERS MESS 504 SQD FENTON LEEDS STOP+**
> 
> **REGRET TO INFORM THE MESS THAT W/C INGRAM EM NOW CONFIRMED**
> 
> **MISSING AS A RESULT OF ENEMY AIR OPERATIONS OVER YPRES ON**
> 
> **MORNING OF 14 MAY + I HAVE INFORMED THE PRIME MINISTER AND NOK**
> 
> **STOP+**
> 
> **== + Folton, AIR MARSH ++ =**
> 
> _RAF Church Fenton_
> 
> _16 May, 1940_
> 
> _Dear Tilly,_
> 
> _I hope you shall forgive my curtness for writing this letter as it accompanies your tenant's M.I.A. telegram. As his closest friend in the R.A.F. NO 504 squadron, I felt it my duty to inform you that Macsen E. Ingram of the Sparrow Division went down at 1000 Hours over Ypres, Belgium on 14 May. He was ordered to go to Air Component stationed in Arras, France, but he was wrongly informed. Air Component has moved, and we have yet to hear word. Please take reassurance in knowing that he is only missing._
> 
> _Though this letter may give little hope, know your tenant is a force to be reckoned with. He will not die so easily._
> 
> _Sincerely,_
> 
> _Richard Gerald Lewis_

**Author's Note:**

> This work, born from inspiration by Dunkirk (Nolan), was created to be my Creative Writing thesis for my Graduate degree. It was a joy to write, and I wish to share it with others who not only have a love for Nolan's Dunkirk (and other works of Historical Fiction), but for those who have a passion for World War 2. Any feedback/comments/critique is heavily appreciated. I will be posting it in sections as I make small edits/changes. 
> 
> I hope all of you are well and continue to be so.


End file.
